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Windows 7 Home Premium Slow Shut Down Possible Cuses Solutions

I am running Windows 7 Home Premium om a IBM/Lenovo ThinkPad X60. 320 GB HD, 2 GB RAM. I have always noticed what I would describe as a slow (prolonged time) shut down since the beginning (after I installed Windows 7) It was a "clean" install as I had been using Windows XP Pro previously.

I remember reading somewhere that, in some situations, Windows 7 does something during shutdown that makes the shut down process longer. The article said that you need to go to the registry and change a value from 1 to 0. It seems like I checked this some time ago and the registry item value was already set (according to the article) to the value that should not lengthen the shut down time.

Can anybody suggest what I might do to identify what is causing the long shutdown times and how to fix the problem? Thanks in advance!

What you want to do is go to the registry and change a couple values. Open the registry and locate the key{ \HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Contro l\Session Manager\Memory Management}, then change the value of ClearPageFile at Shutdown to a 0 IF the value is 1. If the value is 1, it will take longer for your computer to shutdown..this fix cured it all for me. I also did this : HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Contro l\
Highlight the value WaitToKillServiceTimeout
Change this value to 1000.

Useful tip about stopping the clearing of the page file on shut down
and I suspect that'll be the major one for most users. Introduces a
little security issue in that the page file can be searched for login
details etc but if an attacker has physical access to your system then
all bets are off regarding any security you have anyway <lol>

Over time the page file will get cluttered however and the time saving
on shut down will be offset by a gradual slowing of the system whilst
in use. If this tip is implemented then it would be worthwhile
manually clearing the page file once in a while, either by reversing
the registry edit for one shutdown or going into the page file size
setting and select the 'no page file' option then reboot and go back
into this setting and restoring the previous page file size ( make a
note of this before you clear it ). Usually it's a good idea to go
into Safe Mode when re-creating the page file as the lack of it can
cause major hiccups and errors about the page file being too small.
Doing it in Safe Mode get around this. BTW - I prefer to set the
minimum and maximum to the same value as this fixes the location of
the page file on the HD and stops Windows scattering it all over the
place ( another cause of gradual slowing down over time ) - useful to
do a defragment in Safe Mode before recreating too as this gives the
best chance of getting a contiguous area for this.

I'd be leery of changing the time-out settings. You don't want to cut
off a perfectly normally running program before it has time to finish
what it was doing on shut down ( e.g. saving settings ). You could end
up introduce more problems than you were intending to fix <lol>

I'm with you Barry. I'd never do this to my machine. However, the OP wants faster shut down times.
As always, my posts come with no guarantees. I can lead a horse to water but I can't keep him from drowning himself in it.
As for pagefile security, yeah - if you are at my machine, I've already lost the security battle.

Never quite understood the urgency for a speedy shut-down. I can understand fixing a hanging system but I suppose we are all different. I generally shut any programs then click shutdown and shut the lid or walk away it shuts down in it;s own time, I'm sat on the sofa with a cuppa watching The Big Bang Theory lol!

The problem with windows is, it's dealing with effects all the time not the actual causes, its a security nightmare and most of the slow downs are because of third-party software to deal with the weak security windows has.

I think clearing the pagefile is a bit like locking the back door but leaving the windows open < excuse the pun. You can quite easily blank the login of anyone's account on a windows PC/Laptop, so security on windows doesn't really mean much. The fact windows is clearing a pagefile for security reasons is a bit lame and unnecessary.

Usually when Windows takes a long time to shut down it has been updating it self and is processing those downloads. If the system is doing this all the time then windows is having a hard time closing all the running programs and one can help this by closing all open windows and watching to see how many processes are running . programs are always running and some you can control in the control panel. Ill look more into this and get back with you on it if you need more help.